On-base plus slugging (OPS) is asabermetricbaseball statistic calculated as the sum of a player'son-base percentage andslugging percentage.[1] The ability of a player both to get on base and to hit for power, two important offensive skills, are represented. An OPS of .800 or higher inMajor League Baseball puts the player in the upper echelon of hitters. Typically, the league leader in OPS will score near, and sometimes above, the 1.000 mark.
The basic equation is
where OBP ison-base percentage and SLG isslugging average. These averages are defined below as:
- the numerator "H + BB + HBP" effectively means "number of trips to first base at least"
- the denominator "AB + BB + SF + HBP" effectively means "total plate appearances", but does not include sacrifice bunts
This is because though a batter makes a trip to the plate he is not given an "AB" when he walks (BB or HBP) or when he hits the ball into play and is called out, but the action allows a run to score (SF). As a result, the 4 counts (AB + BB + SF +HBP) are needed to calculate a batter's total trips to the plate.
and
where:
In one equation, OPS can be represented as:
On-base plus slugging was first popularized in 1984 byJohn Thorn andPete Palmer's book,The Hidden Game of Baseball.[2]The New York Times then began carrying the leaders in this statistic in its weekly "By the Numbers" box, a feature that continued for four years. Baseball journalistPeter Gammons used and evangelized the statistic, and other writers and broadcasters picked it up. The popularity of OPS gradually spread, and by 2004 it began appearing onTopps baseball cards.[3]
OPS was formerly sometimes known asproduction. For instance,production was included in early versions of Thorn'sTotal Baseball encyclopedia, and in theStrat-O-Matic Computer Baseball game. This term has fallen out of use.
OPS gained popularity because of the availability of its components, OBP and SLG, and that team OPS correlates well with team runs scored.
Bill James, in his essay titled "The 96 Families of Hitters"[4] uses seven different categories for classification by OPS:
| Category | Classification | OPS range |
|---|---|---|
| A | Great | .9000 and higher |
| B | Very good | .8334 to .8999 |
| C | Above average | .7667 to .8333 |
| D | Average | .7000 to .7666 |
| E | Below average | .6334 to .6999 |
| F | Poor | .5667 to .6333 |
| G | Very poor | .5666 and lower |
This effectively transforms OPS into a seven-point ordinal scale. Substituting quality labels such asexcellent (A),very good (B),good (C),average (D),fair (E),poor (F) andvery poor (G) for the A–G categories creates a subjective reference for OPS values.
The top tenMajor League Baseball players in lifetime OPS, with at least 3,000 plate appearances as of June 8, 2024[update], were:
The top five were all left-handed batters. Jimmie Foxx has the highest career OPS for a right-handed batter.[5]
The top ten single-season performances in MLB are:
Gibson holds the highest single-season OPS for a right-hander, while Barry Bonds holds the record for a left-hander. Since 1944, the highest single-season OPS for a right-hander is 1.2224 byMark McGwire in1998, which was 28th all-time.[6]
OPS+, adjusted OPS, is a closely related statistic. OPS+ is OPS adjusted for the park and the league in which the player played. An OPS+ of 100 is defined to be the league average. An OPS+ of 150 or more is excellent and 125 very good, while an OPS+ of 75 or below is poor.
The basic equation for OPS+ is
where *lgOBP is the park-adjusted OBP of the league and *lgSLG is the park-adjusted SLG of the league.
A common misconception is that OPS+ closely matches the ratio of a player's OPS to that of their league. In fact, due to the additive nature of the two components in OPS+, a player with an OBP and SLG both 50% better than the league average in those metrics will have an OPS+ of 200 (twice the league average OPS+) while still having an OPS that is only 50% better than the average OPS of the league. It would be a better (although not exact) approximation to say that a player with an OPS+ of 150 produces 50% moreruns, in a given set of plate appearances than a player with an OPS+ of 100 (though see clarification above, under "History").
Through the end of the 2024 season, the career top twenty leaders in OPS+ (minimum 3,000 plate appearances) were:[7]
The only purely right-handed batters to appear on this list are Hornsby, Judge, Trout, Suttles, Browning, Foxx, McGwire, Orr, and Greenberg. Mantle is the only switch-hitter in the group.
The top ten single-season performances were:[8]
* Fred Dunlap's historic 1884 season came in theUnion Association, which some baseball experts consider not to be a true major league. If Dunlap's seasons was to be eliminated from the list, Charleston's 1921 season would be on the list.
Despite its simple calculation, OPS is a controversial measurement. OPS weighs on-base percentage and slugging percentage equally. However, on-base percentage correlates better with scoring runs.[9] Statistics such aswOBA build on this distinction usinglinear weights. Additionally, the components of OPS are not typically equal (league-average slugging percentages are usually 75–100 points higher than league-average on-base percentages). As a point of reference, the OPS for all of Major League Baseball in 2024 was .711.[10]
